Monday, September 03, 2007

3 Driving Habits that Annoy Me

On the way home from Charlottesville last night, I encountered three driving habits that really annoy me. They are, in no particular order:

1) People who don't drive at a constant speed. I'm not talking about drivers who stay in a plus or minus 5mph range, or adapt to weather or road conditions, which we all do. I'm talking about people who go back and forth between 65 and 85 based on how much they're yakking on their cell phone. Or the people who cut you off in the passing lane in order to pass a truck, but who then decide that they don't want to pass the truck, slow down to the truck's speed and make life miserable for the other 87 cars who are also trying to pass the truck.

2) People who can't figure out how to use their highbeams. I was in front of a driver last night who kept changing his mind on whether I was far enough in front of him to use his brights. Every couple of minutes or so, it was on, off, on, off, on, off, on, off.

3) People who drive way too fast for what they're driving. Example: the Budget rental truck that was being driven by some preppy, bubble-gum blowing, girl in her late teens. She was doing at least 90mph, showed no signs of slowing down, was weaving (badly) in and out of traffic, and nearly caused quite a few accidents in the minute or so that she was in my vicinity. Look, if you're driving a corvette or something and doing 90 and you fly past me, I might curse at you and call you a jerk; but at least you probably have control of your vehicle and aren't causing near accidents left and right. This girl had absolultely no idea what she was doing or how big her truck was, evidenced by the fact that she nearly took out quite a few vehicles, including several trucks who, as it turns out, can react and brake much more quickly than I'd thought. I was seriously amazed that I didn't see her truck flipped over on the side of the road somewhere.